I was in total amazement, a day without lag. O' there was the typical stuff but no yellow and total stops I have been dealing with for a month.
It started with not being able to get into AC. At first I could not get into the zone at all. Then I got into the zone but no worlds were listed. I finally got in though the web site.
I had a great time, running without stopping in mid step, being able run from battle and knowing that what was in front of me was really in front of me.
Late in the day I met my vassal The Saint at the life stone. He had vowed to never return to fighting Tuskers. Well he had changed his mind and had returned. Now he had two bodies deep in the Tusker dungeon. I powered up and he made a portal for us.
We headed down, killing Tuskers as we went. We were going to the left side. I had only gone towards there once when I was with Sidhartha. Sid quickly persuaded me that I did not want to go that way.
A few others were tagging along. We hit a big room and took a ramp on the right side. We made a turn and about 10 tusker guards rushed us. I was fighting when everyone else ran. There were so many guards that I was cut off. I tried to run though them but that just made them mad at me.
I was getting pounded on from all sides and health was draining fast. I tried to heal but it failed. Hit a health potion and tried to fight my way out. I got a message from The Saint, "Are you ok?" My message was simple, 'No", and died shortly after.
At least I had my armor. I had given The Saint one of my robes after buffing it up as he had no armor at all. Loss was, three robes, death necklace (always lose that thing) and my strength V and Coordination V rings.
It cost me 11k a vitae point now, but I only need to clear 4 points. I had hit the Tuskers enough that I lost a point in the portal.
Now I saw that getting my body was a problem. Getting The Saint's two bodies was a much bigger one. I decided to call in friends. First on my list was Luigi, a 40+ fighter. Sidhartha was on but a long way away. Jarad was on and he joined us. Jann my former patron logged on and she agreed to come. Caelstis was going there for a body recovery and agreed to help after that. Adam Sinclair was the other body and he went with us. (He died again, but was in portal and body was at the Lifestone.) Lakin Savi-Di-Pa showed up and he came as well.
Now Jann can probably solo the place and any two or three of the rest could as well. So we had more than enough. It was a walk in the park. In the place where we were torn apart before I had time to step back and rebuff my weapon. Still the place is not to be taken lightly. After getting The Saint's last body we were in a hurry to get back up top or port. Someone made a portal to the beginning and The Saint and I ported.
I made a portal to the Nest for the Saint to tie to. Fighting in the Nest is not safe but we know how to do it better.
I had some leave time from work. With my job going away it seemed a good day to take it. I got up early and hit the Nest. After a short while I leveled up to 58. Seem most of my friends are 60 or better so I'm going to make a push to get it. The best place to level is the Tuskers. Problem is my vassals are all fighting there. Tuskers drop little loot. Comps and stones are expense. In the Nest I can pick up 50k an hour easy. So by default I'm the bank. But even so I can still make the 9 million to 59 in a few days of work.
I headed to my non-lag hunting spot. This is two rooms with an S shaped tunnel between them. Both rooms spawn Workers and Soldiers. If I clear them too fast there is a ramp to the second level. I can use that to draw some Soldiers up.
I was there a short time when Jarad showed up. I met Jarad when he was about 20lv. He e-mailed me to ask if he could be my Vassal. At this time The Saint was my only vassal. I have to admit Jarad is one of the best players I have ever met. He just made 42lv.
We cleared the two rooms and drew a few from the second level. My packs were full with stuff so I ported. A while later I got tell from Jarad. He had just died. He got dragged out of a corner and they got back shots on him. He said that gave him 155 deaths. I have been holding at a death per level so I have 58 now.
He recovered fast as we were both sure where it was. It is one of the benefits of fighting in a known spot. A few minutes later I get a tell from him, "156". He had died while buffing. A bit later he sent me another tell. "No wonder, my armor V had run out." Note to all, check your spell list, you never know when something runs out in battle and you miss the message.
Solclaim
Fist de Yuma (III) hit 9lv and got item the other day. I know Im not ready for the beach but getting bored with Mosswarts. First thing I do is put acid bane I on the leggings. I have my bow out as I want to get a bunch of damage in before a gromnie gets close.
I was very lucky. Typical battle went like this. Twang evades, Twang hit environment, Twang hit for 14. Gromnie hits you for 5, Twang evades, blast acid for 20. Twang hit for 15. Blasts acid for 10, I have 5hp he has 10% health, I evade, I evade, Twang Gromnie drops dead. I cannot say I had a single battle where I did not feel lucky to have won. Every one could have ended at the LS if I had evaded one less shot.
I hit the fort. I hit a bunch of Barkers and other Mosswarts with the bow for a lot of points but no loot. (Dont feel right looting when fighting from the wall.) I grab my weapon and shield to go fight. Barker is attacking someone and I have the back shot. Evade, evade, evade, evade and evade. At this point I felt I had better go work on my stats more and come back later.
While in the mage shop I met a fine fellow named Panzuriel. He knew me for the news groups. He asked me if I needed anything. I was doing well and said no thanks. Then he said he had a matti hide! LOL much better and lighter that my store junk. A quick run to Cregstone and I was lighter and better protected. A big thanks to Panzuriel. Now I will start hunting Reedsharks for leggings.
Thistledown
With my lag clearing up I decided it was time to abandon the draining spot and go adventuring with my mages. Mage Tank had been working on strength, as a melee mage Tank does not want burden. The first thing I found was his skills had deteriorated by draining. Draining is too easy. I had to rework the spell bar and relearn the right way to use War. But the drains still come in handy for getting stamina and health back. He did ok but really needs more mana.
The real fun comes from helping low levels out. A few buffs and heals on a 4lv fighting two Prowlers is a good way to make friends.
I crossed the river and was not sure what the results would be. I saw what lurkers did to Sidhartha and other mages when I was 18lv. He was 19lv and surprise spawns were death to him. Other mages died quick while we crossed rivers. A Lurker would be hiding and mages would die.
I was surprised. My 70 melee defense would evade them half the time. Mostly took 5 to 10 damage a hit. As it only took about 4 acid blasts to bring it down I did well. I will be blasting up the beach for a while. The xp was not as good as when I was draining. But draining is not playing it is boring.
Fist de Mage decided to take healing at 20lv instead of waiting to 35 for melee. This will insure the two mages are different. So far the skill is not good enough to heal from Health to Stamina very well. But that will change. The idea is to stop the resting down time. Resting is dangerous and sometimes impossible to do. I have seen Olthoi kill a resting mage with one shot.
Forge
The family had planed a Frore trip for Friday. I was going along for muscle. I headed over to the Lin hall to see when it would go off. Only a few players there and none knew when the quest would start.
I headed to the Nest to raise a bit of pyreal. I got a message that the quest had left earlier than we thought and it was done. This was disappointing news. But enough players missed it that they were going start a second one.
I returned to Lin and get a portal to the Plateau. There me and Ibn waited for the others. Talon Proudhawk wanted to come and he was spending some time running around trying to get a portal. He had run a long way to help The Saint in the Tusker de-boggle. We left just before he got there. I made sure he was not left behind this time.
I had to break my tie to the Nest so I could get Ibn out at the end. He does not get item until 35lv.
We finally get everyone together and headed out. I had powered up my old fire weapon before we left. A good thing as a few Ice Golems met us there. It turned out that no one knew the way though the maze but Talon. It was a good thing he had showed up.
Between Talan and me the Geldites did not stand much of a chance. Few stood more than a few seconds.
We got turned around a few times but finally made it to a spot with a bunch of gates. Talon did a lot of running around to get the gates opened. We were taking a lot of damage from the cold just standing around. At last we all got to the portal and headed in.
We fought a lot of Geldites and Ice Golems but nothing was too hard. I found a use for my lockpick for once. Still would rather have Creature or Xbow.
The last battle was a bit dicey. I got some de-buffs on me including a Cold de-buff. That one hurt as I was taking a lot of damage from the cold for a while.
Those that had the key got the robes and other stuff. I made a portal for Ibn and we got out. I guess it is not as easy as I'm making it sound. We did find bodies around. Mostly unrecoverable bodies if they did not tie to the beginning portal.
Stone Quest disaster.
I was in Awric about to port to the Nest. I had been there twice that day and made about 100k in pyreal and about 600k in xp. Still had 6 million to 59lv but at 9 million a level I was getting there.
I got a tell from a player. Would I like to go on the Acid Stone quest? I said sure, feeling a strong party would have no problem. I checked and saw Luigi was on and asked if he would like to go. Then saw that Jarad was there and he wanted to go as well.
I should have known something was wrong when they asked us to meet them at Dryreach. I had never been there but Luigi had. A bit of a run but we are both fast. I had heard that Dryreach was hard to get into. But the lock was only at 220 or so. I picked it easily.
Jarad arrived and we ran over to the East Direlands portal. A few Tumeroks started tossing arrows at me so we killed them. They must be stronger than I thought because I took about 60 damage. But if course I never bothered to put on armor or use a weapon. Been a while since I beat things to death with my fists. There was chest that had some sellable stuff.
The others arrived and I could not believe it. There were three of them, 28lv, 31lv and 32lv. Hell, the run from the temple to the Vault might kill them. But I knew that Jarad, Luigi and I could solo it if it came to that. If they were lucky they could follow and not get into battle much. There was also a good chance we would pick up others on the way.
I did have a danger sign. While we were standing there I went yellow. Lag would be death there. Lagging on the run was an unrecoverable death. The reason I left the Vault was the run to it. A short run from the temple but full of very bad stuff. With the new, much harder Direlands I could not imagine how hard it was.
I had gotten some sprint VI shoes from Jocasta the other day. She is a great person and good friend. Felt this would be a good time to try them out.
I powered up and jumped in first. It was a good thing as a big ape was waiting for the first person though. I beat it to death before it could hurt anyone.
A bunch of other stuff jumped us but we cleared them quickly. Jarad said he knew the way and started running. I stayed on his right shoulder. Less than a minute into the run we started running into Bone Lords and Shadows. I had a few de-buffs on me and about 100 points of damage. I saw a message that Jarad had died from a shadow.
I was running for my life with Shadows and Bone Lords on my tail. It seems I got the Sprint VI at the right time. I was able to out run them, even with slow V on me. I had also dumped about 600k into Magic Resistance and had a V ring on. This buffed me to over 180 Magic resistance. I did resist a few spells.
I was lost but thought I saw a place I knew. While trying to get to the Vault one day I was lag turned and ended up in a spot that looked like this. I even found a place where I was safe for a bit. I healed up about 125 damage there.
Taking a look around I saw that was not on the right ridge. The Vault was on the edge of a swamp and this spot did not have one. I finally found the swamp and the right ridge. I was at full sprint with a horde of Direland stuff behind of me when I hit the safely of the Vault. (LOL, the Vault is the safe spot?)
Of course I some nice de-buffs on me. Less melee defense was the worse. My weapon was about out I tried to buff it up. Much more fizzles than normal and I fizzle too much as it is. I even had trouble with my final V spell. I saw why when the Feeble Minded VI wore off.
Luigi was the only other to make it. I got a call from Jarad. I told him getting the body was too hard. All he would do is make more bodies and lose even more stuff. To late, he had another body. This was a bad one as his death items were on the other one.
He asked me if I could help him out. There was no way I could run back there. I would have to port back to Tou-Tou and run to Dryreach to get there. Then there was the problem of what I could do. We needed an Archer or mage to recover his bodies.
I got messages from the others. They had bodies out there too. They of course wanted us to run out and help. Left once and was jumped by a mob. I killed them but had more de-buffs. We got lucky. Jocasta was on and she helped Jarad get his bodies. An Archer or Mage is what you need in the Dirlands body recovery. Melee takes over inside.
By the time Jarad got his bodies he had 15% vit and knew trying another run would not work. Trying to fight in the Vault with vit was not wise either. He headed off to BDC to clear the vit.
The others were not so lucky. They got a few bodies but made more. A high level melee tried to help them but had to port out after a few attempts. Without a mage or archer you are going to leave a carpet of bodies trying to recover.
One tried to get to the vault. He knew that without Jarad we were going not to get the stone but he could get the feel of the place. He died within view of the portal, wasps.
There were a lot of players in the vault but most were staying on top. A few were drawing one or so and fighting them with a lot of screams. Never understood the need for weak players to come here. Other Olthoi spots were safer.
Luigi was having lag problems. In fact a lot of people were. I was so used to my really bad lag that this was nothing. Luigi had to re-log a few times before he could play.
Luigi and I were doing well. Clearing groups of 4 to 6 soldiers. I had to buff so I ran over to the buffing ledge. I had waited too long and had to fight three with a dead weapon. I had missed the V spell running out. I toss SK V instead of VI. I use it running out as a timer to buff.
I cleared it out, rested and re-buffed my weapon. I headed up to the top.
As I hit the ramp I saw a body, then another one. At the top I saw a bunch more. Then I was jumped by 10 soldiers. Aaaa I see the problem. Ever so often enough Soldiers get run up topside to kill everyone or run them out. Weak players will get a few on them and run to the top for help. Others draw them and hope to trap all but one in the tunnel. When this goes wrong it is very bad.
I had two ways out, fight or port. I did not know what happen to Luigi so porting was the second choice. It took a few stamina drinks to clear them. It helped that no others joined the fight. I messaged Lugi if he was ok. He said he was outside. LOL I would rather be inside. He came back in and we linked up.
I decided to head a bit deeper into the Vault with Luigi. We ran into a good Archer. We did not say were going after the stone with him but he sees us going that way. We cleared out anything that got close and let him kill everything else.
After the bridges the Archer started to loot and buff. I felt he would be right behind us. We headed into one of the harder spots. I did not see much so I started across a room to the next passage. Some came out of that passage and blocked me off. More from every direction charged in.
I was in a circle of Soldiers, being hit from every direction. I was not to worried as I felt Luigi and the Archer would get them off me. It was getting tight. I had killed a bunch but more were arriving. Luigi was on the outside of the pack attacking, getting in back shots. But there were not dying fast enough.
I knew I could not port as Luigi would be hung out to dry. I drank a bunch of stamina was able to get a heal in. First time I was able to do that in a big battle. It took time but we finally killed them. Luigi had one word after that. "Wow". I voiced my agreement.
I figured out what happened to the archer. He was getting all the loot and had his wand out because he was porting, not buffing.
We made our way back with a few battles but nothing like that one. I was tired but wanted to get a point of item before left. My fizzles had dropped to 3 or 4 to 1 and maybe few more would make it even better. Next will be to get my lore to a raw 209. I have a Focus V and a Self V I need to use. This requires removing my helm and putting on a lore IV. But getting my lore to 209 I will remove that step. It will also give me a 249 buff lore with my lore V Wand.
My item costs 1.2 million a point now. It had trained to 1.1k. A long days work. Luigi had to leave and I was tired. I had stopped looting because I could not carry any more. But it was 1 am and I was long passed beat. Bunch of Nest trips, the run and big battles had taken their toll on me. With about 100k for the item point left I ported out.
I met Luigi at the portal. I told him I would arrange a portal to the Temple. It is not the hard run from the East Direland portal. With maybe a few more good fighters we would get him and Jarad the stone.
Jarads Story.
The first time I died I didnt even realize I was in much danger until
it was too late. All the sudden 3 lich lords smack me with a few level 5
spells and I'm at the LS. It happened so fast I didnt get to check my
coords. Good thing Luigi gave them to me as he ran by. So I got back to
there without my prize leggings and managed to avoid the lich lords that
time. The bad thing was that there were 2 bone knights and one bone lord
guarding my corpse.....ergh. As if they werent hard enough, I had 5%
vitea and no leg protection. so I got smacked another time, at least it
was further back and retrievable this time though.
When I got back to the LS Jocasta was there to, we use the same one.
She told me to get a faran robe since I had NO armor at this point, good
idea. She buffed it with some 5s and I headed back into the death
zone. I got my second body without trouble because it was in an
unguarded spot, but I stuck with the robe for the moment. I figured I
could pick off the skells one at time by drawing them away then beating
on them. It may have worked to, if I didn't get jumped by a gold wasp!
Ugh....it just never ends I thought to myself......
So back at the LS Jocasta sees that theres no way I'm getting my
bodies alone and offers to help me, so I surprisingly opened a portal
after many tries and we went in. Of course, now there were 3 bone
knights RIGHT AT THE PORTAL EXIT! So I run my arse off to the nearest
portal, a small tumerock complex. I hid behind a wall and waited for
word from Jocasta, she didnt know where my body was so I'd have to lead
her. She made it to a safe place and ran into another archer, who offered
to help as well, Timber.
So I was really happy at this point. Two archers with composite bows
and blunt arrows should be able to pick off 3 bone knights without much
trouble. First we got the body from the gold wasp, which only took about
3 arrows :) Then we move over a bit to the area with my first body.
There were now a couple of low tumerocks there guarding my body instead
of the skels, so I felt like a big Jackass, I could have taken them even
with my 15% vitea.
But it all worked out ok, the archers nailed the tumerocks and I got my
body. (See, archers CAN be useful :) I hit LS recall and waited for Jo,
She gave me a BDC tie so I could go in there and lose my vitea, but then
she logged. I was happy, but with that much vitea I couldnt use most
of my magic items. Luckily, My friend Talon Proudhawk just logged on and
he has creature magic. So I got buffed up and headed into BDC.
Hehe, on my FIRST ever trip to BDC with my old char I never would have
considered it a good place to lose vitea :) But after not too long I lost
it all and decided to call it a night, I had enough torture for one day
:) So it all worked out ok, didnt get my acid stone, but at least I
didnt lose anything, actually gained something.......a +3 bonus to my
death count! :)
Hopefully nest time I try to get the stone Ill die more in the dungeon
than outside :)
Jarad Ryujii
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